Barack Obama beats Mitt Romney to win the 2012 US election
Victory ... President Barack Obama
AP:Associated Press
Published: 27 minutes ago
BARACK Obama is back in the White House after winning the 2012 US presidential election.
America’s first black leader beat Mitt Romney in the closely fought battle tonight to secure another four years as the most powerful man in the world.As US TV networks reported he had won, Obama tweeted: "This happened because of you. Thank you."
He then tweeted: "Four more years."
See how the election night has unfolded in our live news blog
Early indications suggested a long drawn-out election after tight exit polls in the swing states of Ohio and Virginia.
But the momentum started to swing in the early hours to Obama as he took Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
That meant Romney's only way to the Oval office was to take the crucial states of Ohio, Virginia and Florida to get over the target of 270 electoral college votes.
Then Obama picked up the vital state of Ohio according to projections to end Romney’s bid to be the first Mormon to lead the States.
Earlier during the night the president's campaign made sure people did not leave voting queues early, urging its supporters on Twitter to #stayinline.
Earlier Obama and Romney had each grabbed early wins in states traditionally loyal to their parties.
Using exit polls, US television networks projected victories for Republican Romney in Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Democrat incumbent Obama has picked up Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois,Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont - all states in which he was favourite.
Obama looks set for second chance
My View on US election 2012 by Tom Newton Dunn, Political Editor
THE longest, dirtiest and the most expensive election in history is finally over.
It cost an eye-watering $6BILLION, but it looks to have ended just as the pollsters all long ago predicted - America has given Barack Obama a second chance.
Neither of the candidates should remember their campaigns with any pride.
Both were brutal, cynical and relentlessly negative.
Obama’s apparent victory has as much to do with Mitt Romney’s failure to convince Americans he had anything better to offer than his own prowess.
The US fell out of love with the great Chicago orator some time ago because he failed to deliver the impossible heights of change he once promised them.
But from tax cuts to Iran and health care, his challenger Governor Romney flip-flopped on just too much in the end to be a credible alternative.
One of the happiest with an Obama win this morning will be David Cameron, and not least because of their close personal bonds.
The result looks to have proved that an incumbent CAN survive in these grim economic times after all.
That bucks the trend long set by France’s Nicolas Sarkozy, Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi, Gordon Brown and many others.
Obama’s place in the history books was booked four years ago when he became the US’s first black president.
But he is very far from being a great president yet.
Because it was so close with just a few percentage points in it, the election still leaves America deeply divided as a nation - between left and right, fans of welfare spending big government versus tax cutting state shrinkers.
Obama’s job now is to unite them, to find a common ground on which the whole country can agree to progress.
And he will not be able to do that until he works out a consensus on how to tackle the US’s hideous £1trillion deficit.
Only then could he be great.